The price is going to determine whether this thing is the next Cube. I assume they'll have user-accessible RAM slots, but storage and GPU are out. It should be priced to reflect that lack of accessibility, and not just the looks of the machine.

Basically a glorified Mac Mini with zero upgrade path except plugging in external Thunderbolt boxes as needed. It even sounds like it's a single socket system supporting up to 12 cores, but perhaps is dual socket.

Also AMD graphics which is sub-par to the latest NVidia TITAN line but all deeply integrated so no ability to change them is a bit of a slap.

Basically a glorified Mac Mini with zero upgrade path except plugging in external Thunderbolt boxes as needed. It even sounds like it's a single socket system supporting up to 12 cores, but perhaps is dual socket.

Also AMD graphics which is sub-par to the latest NVidia TITAN line but all deeply integrated so no ability to change them is a bit of a slap.

Wonder if the RAM and PCI-e flash is all on motherboard as well....

But hey.. those three or four times you have to move the machine over the course of its lifetime, it will be EASY...

I'm incredibly glad that they actually updated the Mac Pro, but there isn't really enough information yet for me to have a firm opinion. I'm not a fan of all-external expansion, but honestly I only use my Mac Pro for basic tasks so it doesn't really impact me (aside from GPU upgrades). I hope they mean dual GPS are 'standard' the same way the 2.66GHz CPUs were standard in the original Mac Pro with the option to spec down to a lesser option. I really want to see the price, but I'm expecting it to start even higher than the current model.

Garbage, as bad as the worst predictions that weren't outright canceling the whole system. Apple has actually become what haters long falsely claimed: a company that puts form over function, rather then understanding that good form is part of function. God damn I'm so disappointed .

Garbage, as bad as the worst predictions that weren't outright canceling the whole system. Apple has actually become what haters long falsely claimed: a company that puts form over function, rather then understanding that good form is part of function. God damn I'm so disappointed .

Garbage, as bad as the worst predictions that weren't outright canceling the whole system. Apple has actually become what haters long falsely claimed: a company that puts form over function, rather then understanding that good form is part of function. God damn I'm so disappointed .

DOOM! DOOM! Sorry I couldn't resist.

I viewed the Mac Pro and MBP this time around as a bit of a litmus test for the new culture of Apple as a whole. It'll be the first system that's really from the New Team. Apple's secretive, so we need to look at their actions and products to get an idea of the mindset.

And in all seriousness, I really do find it pretty concerning. Maybe I'm late to the party here, but in the past I always disagreed with people complaining about "thinness" or "form over function" with stuff like the portables obviously but also the Mini and iMac. For all those products, the form was an important part of the function, and I thought Apple had worked hard to strike a good balance, recognizing where the form (and resulting power and use characteristics) was itself a feature, even if not the kind of easily bullet-pointed feature that a lot of geeks tend to recognize.

Now though that no longer seems to be the case, it's been elevated to a fetish for itself rather then something that comes naturally from good design. They briefly made that mistake with the Cube, and I thought they'd learned their lesson, but nope. This is the Cube all over again except now it's the Column and worse, there isn't an alternative. If the rMBP tosses the dGPU in favor of Iris Pro I think that'd be another sign, although at least in that case an external GPU actually could make it at least sort of OK.

Quote:

Chill, I'm sure its not THAT bad.

It really is though. We covered this all in an early big Mac Pro thread, and I guess some retread happened in the last one, but it really is a complete step backwards for nothing gained.

Pretty disappointed here, as I am one of those cheap guys who had hoped for a more affordable Mac Pro. I don't need Fire pro graphics (much less DUAL fire pro graphics) or 12-core xeons. I just need a Mac in which I could install a gaming GPU (cause I use my Mac for not-so-demanding scientific work and I like gaming and love OS X). I think the hackintosh is my last option. When I purchased my Mac Pro in 2006, it was probably more than I really needed but I wanted to own one. It will be my last desktop Mac. That's a shame, it's been a great machine.

Mac Pro Mini. It's like an old Mac Pro, except it sounds like there's only one CPU and no internal expandability (or likely upgradability) whatsoever. How many RAM slots do you think are in that thing? I woudn't be suprrised if you couldn't even upgrad the RAM. Oh I'm just overjoyed at the thought of all the external crap I'm going to have assuming I buy into this thing.

I wonder what will happen to the expansion market. So far, I'm only aware of a couple of thunderbolt hubs that split out to the usual video and so on, but those are one piece units. Is a good expansion box possible? On the other hand, these'd be great for background pieces for Star Wars action figures. And can this sucker be taken apart? If so, there might be some interesting hacks possible.

So...they killed the Mac Pro and made Cube 2.0 (Now in Cylindrical Form!).

Sure it looks nice when it's just sitting there by itself, but it's going to look like crap once there's a bunch of cables and boxes hanging off it. And do people really care how this stuff looks? These are computers that get a card or two shoved in them, then stuffed under a desk or crammed in a lab where no one ever looks at them.

In creating a pro computer for the future, we wanted to provide an enormous amount of expansion — without being limited to the space inside the enclosure. Designed with built-in Thunderbolt 2, USB 3, Gigabit Ethernet, and HDMI 1.4 ports, Mac Pro sets a new standard in flexible, high-performance expansion. It’s our most expandable Mac yet. And it has everything you need to build a workstation completely customized to what you need and how you work.

Even tho it's backwards compatible, I expect this to spur the adoption of TB2. I expect apple to sell many of these, based on the aesthetics and the combined raw power. I do wonder about the thermal efficiency of this arrangement. How many of these can you put in one small area without affecting global warming.

It does seem like Apple has completely lost the plot of what a pro desktop machine does compared to their other computers, with the potential for this to turn into the next Cube. It even has fewer USB ports than the pathetic amount it had before, so instead of adding a PCI USB card like now I'll have to have a rats nest of a hub. Style and size over functionality.

I'm sure there is a market for what the new one does that greatly appreciates what they are doing, but I feel they are closing out a sizable chunk that does not. I just want PCI slots, discreet GPU, lots of memory slots and drive bays, with little need for a monster CPU. So hackintosh it is for my next desktop. (2009 Mac Pro user)

Can't wait to se what the rack mount for this will look like. Certainly there will be an Nvidia option, won't there? Moving the storage and expansion external may be forward thinking but given that it will be a new bus (thunderbolt2) how long will we have to wait for third party support? And if its hella expensive they won't be moving much volume after the well heeled latest and greatest crowd update. i'm also surprised that we are twenty posts down in the thread with no trashcan jokes. This is not a faster horse, its a whole new thing. Might be the new cube, but it might be the new iMac.

From my reliable source:The tower MacPro is indeed dead. It will be replaced by a headless Mac with on board graphics and one PCIe slot. Of course it will also have TB. CPU choices will be limited to 4 or 8. Not certain about RAM slots or internal HD expansion.

Take it all with a grain of salt if you like. But this guy has a history of being right. Most notably when pictures of the G4 Cube leaked he 100% authenticated them. When Jobs walked off stage I mercilessly mocked him and then Jobs pulled the "one more thing". My source literally made me chew on my hat (baseball cap) for revenge.

Things he's uncertain about, timeline, RAM slots and internal HD. He thinks it's possible (though unlikely) the MacPro may get one more update.

He's (almost) always right when he makes predictions. He knew the xServes were dead well before anyone else and he also knew about the introduction of the aluminum iMacs before any of the rumor sites. The one notable exception being the iPhone 4. He knew for a fact that Gizmodo had found an engineering shell and the final design would look different.

Feel free to dig up this post and make fun of me when I turn out to be wrong. I'd answer follow up questions but I don't know anything more and it would be pure speculation versus the mere rumor spreading that I've just done.

Headless Mac, yeson board graphics, yesone PCIe slot, no, but does include two video cardsCPU 4 to 8, No up to 12

It's certainly what a lot of people hoped it wouldn't be but it is pretty close to what some people were imagining. The lack of expandability is a drag - The old design was such a pleasure to change things in but in all honesty, we can bitch and whine as much as we like and it might be priced very competitively like the first one. I know it's unlikely because its made in 'Murica.

Oh, and another "nice" thing about using TB2 rather then just having TB and normal expansion ports is that we get to wait extra long for it also. Apple was clearly concerned that we might all be overwhelmed if a new Mac Pro came as soon as September when we just barely got one in 2010 so they helpfully made sure to tie it to an entirely different Intel chipset that is still under active development and is slated for 2014 (although maybe Apple will manage to get earlier samples I guess and hit it in Nov/Dec). Totally worth another few months delay for something that would be more accurately termed Thunderbolt 1.1 since it merely increments to DP1.2 and bonds two of the channels, no overall increase in bandwidth, though an individual device can more easily use more.

So, is anyone looking at this and thinking, "I gotta get me one of these!"

I'm actually genuinely curious; not in a snarky way, but I'm interested in seeing how well Apple is truly predicting the wants and needs of a thin sliver of pro users. Does this fit into your planning for a top-of-the-line machine, and if so, how so?

Headless Mac, yeson board graphics, yesone PCIe slot, no, but does include two video cardsCPU 4 to 8, No up to 12

I would say close in concept, missed on the details

Well it was a long time ago. The thing that he definitively had info about was that the Mac Pro, as we all knew it, was dead. He also told me that the new Mac Pro would debut early first quarter of 2013. I'm gonna give him half credit.